


when i bow down to pray (i try to make the worst seem better)

by savanting



Series: The Place That Should Have Never Been [1]
Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dark Fairy Tale Elements, Descendants Au, Evie Is a Good Girl, F/F, Fairy Mal, Fairy Tale Elements, Friends to Enemies, Gen, Isle of the Lost (Disney), Isle of the Lost (Disney) is a Terrible Place, Light Angst, Light Malvie, Loosely Related One-Shots, Not Canon Compliant, One Shot, The Hint of Something More, malvie, slight f/f
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:15:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26162506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savanting/pseuds/savanting
Summary: Evie may have the softest heart of all on the Isle of the Lost, but that certainly doesn't make things any easier. (AU)
Relationships: Evie & Evil Queen (Disney), Evie & Mal (Disney), Evie/Mal (Disney), Mal & Maleficent (Disney)
Series: The Place That Should Have Never Been [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1910803
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	when i bow down to pray (i try to make the worst seem better)

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own any Disney properties. This is the first of my series "The Place That Should Have Never Been," focusing on the Isle and the villain kids and their plights, and we'll even go beyond to Auradon at some point in the series (leading up to some events that will be familiar, if you just turn your head and squint a bit). This is basically a fairy tale fantasy with some modern twinges from the movies (like make-up, nail polish, etc.). I hope you guys enjoy it.
> 
> Title comes from lyrics in the song "Million Reasons" by Lady Gaga.

Before Evie ever put stitches to fabric, she had tended to wounds inflicted upon kids who could have been her little brothers or sisters in another life. She would murmur, “Shh, shh, shh,” to them as they whimpered over cuts and bruises – sometimes from the hands of their abusive parents, other times from the scuffles that often erupted among little kids who grew up knowing how to do only wrong. And, always, they would sniffle and offer her watery smiles before saying they would be fine, it didn’t hurt that bad, they wouldn’t let it happen again. Evie didn’t believe them – it _always_ happened again, and most times worse – but she would smile back and ruffle their hair or stroke their dirty cheeks.

Then it was the process of putting her mask back on, pursing her lips and touching up her make-up, before she reentered the world of Queen Grimhilde, who once called herself the fairest mother of them all.

Her mother’s castle, despite the odds, still stood as an immaculate structure on the Isle of the Lost. Its brilliant veneer hid its ugliness, however, because inside roamed rats amid rooms ridden with dust and broken furniture. Her mother’s own appearance may have been the envy of the courtiers left behind in the Old Kingdom, but her servants – which ones had been deemed evil enough to be imprisoned by the Isle’s magic – had abandoned her in the days after the Isle’s creation. Even Evie’s own father had fled eventually, not so much even leaving behind a name for her to know, and her mother would never speak of him.

Isolation didn’t mesh well with Grimhilde. Her hours were spent staring at her reflection, preening, convinced she still rivaled Snow White in beauty. But those were deceptions.

When Evie entered the throne room that afternoon, she approached her mother slowly. Grimhilde’s black hair hung unwashed around her face and shot through with streaks of gray. Her eyes were underlined by shadows, her once-beautiful face now sallow and thin. The woman saw none of it, however, and continued to smile at herself in the golden hand mirror she carried with her everywhere throughout the castle.

It made Evie sick to her stomach to look at her. Not because of her mother’s faded beauty, no. But because she was trapped here with her, every single day, with no respite. But where else was there to go? The slums were no better a place for her, and Evie did not want to give up the small creature comforts she had within the castle, like the bed she slept on and the wardrobes full of the clothes others had left behind.

And this was still her mother. Mad, vain, and powerless, but still her mother.

“Mother,” Evie said, her voice only managing to dust the carpet because of how little her mother was aware of her presence. She cleared her throat, but her mother just plucked at the knots in her hair as if they were voluminous locks tumbling around her shoulders. Then Evie sighed before stepping closer – quietly, quietly – until she stood to her mother’s side, visible within the mirror. “Oh, Mother,” she whispered, her fingertips stroking her mother’s cheekbone that was still sharp under her skin, “when was the last time you ate?”

But Grimhilde didn’t hear her. She rarely ever did. Her mother’s spells of disassociation were becoming more and more frequent.

Evie swallowed another sigh before stepping back, into shadow, so far outside her mother’s memories that she didn’t know if there would ever be a way back in – or if it would even be worth it to try and find a place there.

Given what Evie knew about the Isle children and their parents, however – she couldn’t help the thought that it really could have been worse.

*

The cupboards in the castle kitchen were empty. Whatever was left of the last time Evie had dared to go into the slum market had gone rancid – or eaten by the rats who thrived in the wooden cabinets. And Evie, armed with only wooden spoons, would not harm them. After all, if she had lived a different tale, she could have been enchanted to become a rat. And, even with the whispers that no magic bled on the Isle, who really knew how true that was? One of those rats could have once been a lady-in-waiting to her mother back when Grimhilde had ruled over court.

When Evie trekked out of the castle, she wore one of the few cloaks that didn’t engulf her; it was a midnight blue, the perfect shade of color she wished her hair could have been. But Evie’s locks were as black as night, the same shade as her mother’s, the same shade – Evie imagined – Snow White’s hair had been the moment her mother had set her sights upon the princess.

But Evie tried not to think of Snow White. Because then she would wonder: _What if Snow White had died, like my mother had wanted? What if my mother had truly become the fairest of them all?_

She shook off the wondering. Snow White had lived, Queen Grimhilde had been banished, and Auradon thrived past the Isle of the Lost.

When Evie finally arrived in the slums, she tried to keep her head down as much as possible to go by unnoticed. The Isle was rife with gangs of all kinds, but the worst of them targeted the lone ones, like her, who stood out. She would need to get out of the market itself before anyone could spy her and think she might have something to offer.

The offerings were slim, as usual, as her eyes scanned the various makeshift tents. Hardened loaves of bread, some stinking fish that smelled like it had been sitting in the sun too long, cheese that smelled almost as bad as the fish did. But she found some rolls, a bundle of dried herbs she could use to flavor boiled water, and dried apples that smelled like heaven because all the orchards had died on the Isle during Maleficent’s last stand against Auradon before the barrier had really and truly trapped all evil for good.

Then Evie’s eyes rose from her basket and caught the hint of light upon a familiar head of hair.

_Speaking of Maleficent…_

Evie drew back into the shadow of a tent and spied Mal, whose gang ruled over all others on the Isle. She was alone today, thank goodness, but that didn’t really mean a thing at the end of the day.

Mal’s green eyes surveyed the market stalls like they were ripe for the plucking – and, given her reputation, they probably were. She didn’t have to barter or hand over rusty coins; if she wanted, then so the slum merchants would hand over.

It had to be the nature of being Maleficent’s daughter. The evil fairy still had her talons choking the life out of this Isle just as she had tried to do in the world outside.

But Evie wouldn’t stand off against Mal. Not today. It was bad enough her mother was deteriorating more by the day. She made a side-step to go down a nearby alleyway.

_Thunk._

A throwing dagger had caught on Evie’s cloak and nearly ripped it off her shoulders. _No,_ she thought helplessly to see a large tear now running through the blue fabric. _This was my favorite cloak._

She supposed her mother wasn’t the only one who had the wrong priorities at times.

Then she turned to the culprit and felt a tiny bit of hate creep into her heart.

Once, they had been like sisters. Now – well, things had changed.

“Well, hello there, Evelyn,” Mal said, a smirk slashed across her mouth. “You don’t come ‘round these parts anymore. How’s old Grim doing?”

Evie picked up the discarded dagger and tossed it in the air before catching it. “Oh, you know, she’s trying for world domination from the comfort of her throne room. What about your mother?”

It was easy being a tad nasty back, just the slightest, with a lilt of wit to her voice. Evie felt like her mother’s daughter right then – the old Grimhilde, the one who had brewed poisons and changed skins and kept hearts locked in boxes.

Mal’s eyes narrowed, and then she held out her hand for the dagger. Evie reluctantly handed it over. “Hell if I know,” she said. “I keep hoping she’ll kick the bucket, but fairies apparently don’t die easily. Well, obviously, given that she survived long enough to be trapped here. But there’s something to be said for an old bitch who won’t die, huh?”

Evie could tell that Mal said the words just to make her squirm inside: after all, Grimhilde’s sanity had been in deterioration even back when the former queen had been in good favor with Maleficent. And there had been days, when Evie had been younger and so much more naïve, that she had allowed Mal to sneak into the castle and play within the abandoned rooms. Her mother had been like a ghost haunting them those days.

“I would love to stay for a chat,” Evie said sweetly, “but I must be going. Mother gets worried when I tarry too long, after all.”

Before Evie could even make a move to dash away – in a measured way, of course – the dagger touched her chin. Evie nearly hissed as the blade dug into her soft skin. Fairy reflexes – they had killed people on and off the Isle, before and after the exile.

“Just remember,” Mal said, “I could run you and your mother out of that castle at any moment. It’s by my grace and mercy that you aren’t sleeping under the docks with the sea scum.”

Then, even before Evie could say a word to stand up for herself against the wicked fairy spawn, she was shoved away. Like a bug that wasn’t even worth stomping underfoot. And all she could do was watch Mal walk away, free, powerful in her cruelty.

And Evie couldn’t help feeling a pinprick of envy in her heart.

*

The keening at night was the worst. Grimhilde rarely slept well, and she would walk circles in her room at all hours until, finally, she would fall exhausted onto the bed in her room. But her shrieks until then – well, there was a reason Evie slept as far from her mother’s quarters as possible.

When it was too loud for her to sleep, Evie would pull off the sheet that covered the shattered mirror that had once been her mother’s most precious possession. She had smuggled it away from a storage chamber, nearly cutting her fingers on sharp glass in the process, but now it lay propped against a wall for Evie to inspect whenever she was a little curious.

The magic may have bled from the Isle, sapped from all those who would seek to use it for gain, but that didn’t mean every once-magical object was useless. The mirror was not a portal or doorway for escape, nor could it be used for ill measures. But – the shards still held together in the pane of the mirror’s frame did show Evie things from time to time.

Tonight, through one shard, Evie could see Auradon in all its splendor.

And sometimes that was bad enough.

But tonight it was worse: there was a celebration. Ladies dressed in all manner of glamour and style – enough for Evie to feel jealousy and want vibrate through her – danced with hands meeting and parting from gentleman in beastly masks of all animal-kind. Evie then realized: it must have been the prince’s birthday.

She had glimpsed the prince through the shards once or twice – and had been unimpressed. Any man of the Isle could have bested him with sword or dagger. Against magic? The prince would have been the most helpless of all.

Even she could have protected him, and that would have been a mistake indeed.

But watching him – she was curious, perhaps to her own fault. After all, her want for that life outside the Isle was the kind of thing that could have eaten her up from the inside-out.

More and more, she had begun to realize how her mother could have wanted something so much that she had practically paid with her soul for the chance to see her vision occur. But it had not worked. It had not worked.

And Evie was here, paying every day for the crimes of her insane mother.

When Evie did at last glimpse the prince, she brushed her fingertips against the broken looking glass. But her eyes did not stay on him: they traveled to the castle, the cheering crowd, the beautiful finery of the kingdom’s citizens.

That was a beautiful life she would never, never know.

And just knowing that burned like nothing else.

*

Evie ventured out in the slums one early morning when the mist still permeated the Isle streets. She had bundled up some clothes, the kind that she had no use for, to give out to the children who would need the protection in the colder weather to come. The Isle may have had a barrier around it, but that didn’t mean that they were protected from storms, especially with the sea. It wasn’t much, but it was the only thing she could think to do.

And it took her away from her mother for a few hours.

The orphans were the most grateful. They were the abandoned, usually, though some of their parents were no longer of this world (usually the work of Hades, flexing his might in the only ways he could now that he was no longer a god). But the gladness in their faces – that was real, powerful, the stuff of magic and happily ever afters. Just seeing their smiles made Evie forget she was looking at the children of exiled villains.

“Oh, look, a little rat scurried out of its hole,” came a voice behind her, and Evie turned to see that Mal had found her once again. The children scattered away, escaping down alley ways and their well-known shortcuts, and Evie couldn’t blame them. Besides, Mal wasn’t here for them; she was here for Evie.

“What is it, your wickedness?” Evie said, not feeling the need to hide her snideness. “You rule over the Isle slums already. Just what do you want from me?”

Mal eyed Evie like an animal staring down its lunch. “When did you get such a mouth on you?”

 _”I learned from the best.”_ But Evie wasn’t ready for a punch. Or worse.

“Let’s just say I’m trying not to get killed out here,” she settled for saying.

Mal actually snorted. “Well, you’re not doing a very good job, are you, _Evelyn_?” she said in a mocking high voice as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“Mal—”

“ _Don’t_ ,” the half-fairy said with a curl to her lips. “Don’t act like you want to play nice now. You abandoned me, just like the rest of them did. And do you think I’ll forget that? Or forgive you, since you decided to pander and play nice with all the kids who beg you for help?”

The words were worse than a punch might have been. Evie even bit back a grimace as she watched her ex-friend – her sister, blood to blood, through a pact from their scarred thumbs – stare at her with pure malice.

Could this have been worse? Evie didn’t think so.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” Evie finally said at last. “Believe me, I didn’t want this either. But your mother – your mother is . . . persuasive.”

To say the least of what Maleficent had threatened, with all her underlings and her grip on the Isle – but fairy machinations had never been kind, at least from the study Evie had done in the sprawling library within the castle. And Mal was just one more in the long line of fey tormenting the vulnerable humans – though the fairy didn’t look so imposing now, even with her green eyes alight with wisps of hurt.

Mal just shook her head. “I hope you rot in hell.”

And that was honestly not the worst thing the half-fairy girl could have said.

*

The next few days seemed to pass in a blur – but one thing pervaded: Queen Grimhilde’s mania grew more and more erratic. Her mother began to wander the halls, walking as if she could barely stand in some rooms while running through others; Evie grew exhausted following her, instead choosing to tag her mother’s ankle with a string of bells so that she might have some idea of where the mad queen lingered in the castle during her spells.

But then one morning Evie stirred to the tinkling of bells, only to awaken fully and find that the bells lay on her bedroom floor, discarded. And from the hallway bounded the echoes of laughter. Evie brushed sleep from her eyes and untangled herself from the blankets. Then she dashed into the hall, nearly tripping in the process.

“Mother!” she called, her voice ricocheting back at her through the vaulted ceilings and their emptiness.

But there was no answer or even a sound.

*

No matter how Evie fretted or searched the seemingly never-ending rooms of the castle, Grimhilde did not turn up. Even the castle grounds, past the dead apple orchard and to the drawbridge with its stinking moat, showed no apparent place where Grimhilde could have hid. She must have gone beyond, into the city and its slums – and no one knew the network of the city and its branches better than Mal did.

When Evie found the girl lounging in the warehouse the fairy called home, riddled with its neon paint and smell of rust, she did not allow for any pretense. “I need your help,” she said, simply, her eyes dead-set on the girl who had once been friend, whom Evie now needed to be her ally more than ever before.

Mal’s eyes flitted from Evie and to the fingernails she was painting. “It seems you remember your loyalties only when you need something,” she said, every bit her mother in that moment as she blew on her electric green nails to make them dry faster. “But what’s in it for me, Evelyn?”

“You know the city better than anyone on the Isle,” Evie said, “and my mother’s missing. I’ll do anything to see her returned safely to the castle.”

A smile curved over Mal’s lips. “Old Grim’s flown the coop then? Good for her.” When Evie didn’t say a word, Mal leaned forward. “Oh, Evie, lighten up. I have spies all over the Isle. She’ll be found within an hour of my snapping my fingers and telling the hounds to go out and sniff around.”

Evie steeled herself. “So what do you want, Mal? I can give you anything you want from the castle—”

“Don’t insult me,” Mal said, voice sharp but quiet as she looked up from her nails. “I don’t want any of your garbage. That castle could be ransacked at any moment, but the slum lords leave it alone. Do you know why?”

Evie’s hands trembled at her sides before she balled them into fists. “No,” she said at last. “I don’t know why we’re safe in the castle.”

Mal stood, stalking closer and closer until she stood within an arm’s reach of Evie – and the shorter girl reached out a hand to brush Evie’s hair off her shoulder, the strands twiddled between the fairy’s fingertips before she let them pass through her fingers like water. “It’s because _I_ say so. My mother wanted you and Grimhilde dead, but I bartered for your lives. I said you would be useful to me someday. And my mother loves nothing more than the promise of more pawns for future use.”

Evie felt her heart thump in her chest as she watched Mal assess her slowly with those green eyes that matched the freshly coated nail polish on her fingers. “Okay,” she said. “Then where does that leave us?” _And where does that leave my mother and me?_

Mal’s smile slanted, and Evie’s heart beat double-time. “Why, Evelyn, I think that means you’re beholden to me.” Then, more softly, “What choice do you have?”

Evie’s shoulders slumped. Her best option other than Mal’s offer would be to run from the warehouse and seek the help of the pirates, or the other slum lords like Jafar’s minions, or any other avenue than the fairy who looked at her like she was only a threat away from devouring her whole. Evie supposed this was the fruit of her isolation, that she had never sought to make any other ties on the Isle other than with the street urchins who could do no more to help Evie than they could for themselves.

When Evie did not answer, Mal pressed a kiss to her cheek – as if they were still dear friends or something with the promise of even more – and whispered, “Good girl.”

Then, with magic even the Isle could not forbid, Evie sealed a deal with the fairy who had once been her best friend.

*

True to Mal’s word, Grimhilde was soon found cowering under thorn and bramble bushes on the outskirts of Maleficent’s dark castle. When Evie found out, she suspected it had been a set-up of some kind: how convenient that Grimhilde would be right under Maleficent’s nose, so close for Mal’s lackeys to snatch up as if the search had been no trouble in the first place. Never mind that Evie could not have gone to that part of the Isle anyway: she had long ago been forbidden to dwell in Maleficent’s territory. It was a wonder Grimhilde didn’t see some punishment for the same trespass, though perhaps she had the fact of her insanity to call to Maleficent’s sympathies – or future cruelty.

For Mal’s part, the half-fairy said nothing of her part in Grimhilde’s reappearance, and Evie – she was just glad to have her mother safely back in the castle.

But the truth of it was that Evie was afraid. She had managed to avoid the Isle politics for so long, yet now she would stand as Mal’s right-hand woman. And Mal would use her for all she was worth.

“Don’t be a sour apple,” Mal said in a voice that could have been teasing – or just cruel. “We get to be best friends again. Didn’t you want that?”

Evie didn’t know. Maybe once she had, but now – now she looked at Mal and just saw the makings of a monster, the would-be heiress to Maleficent’s reign.

But there were some things Mal did not yet know.

Like about the mirror hidden in Evie’s chambers.

Like about the prince who was dangerously close to becoming king of that golden kingdom.

Like about the fact that Evie had read about the ways to kill a fairy – if it came to that, if she could find it in herself to raise an iron dagger to the girl who was – had been – her oldest friend.

Evie was like her mother in that respect: she could hold her secrets back until the time was right. She would bide her time, play her part, and plan.

Someday she would get off the Isle. Someday she would help her mother. Someday she would know a life beyond strife and ill will.

“Come along, Evie,” Mal said, as if they were best friends just like old times. Evie buried the spite in her heart and tried to plaster a smile on her perfectly made-up face. “We have new recruits to find.”

And Mal was just like her mother too: her over-confidence would be her downfall, because she couldn’t imagine a world where someone could outsmart her or beat her at her own game. But Evie would best the fairy, the girl of two worlds, the one who promised only more chaos on the Isle – and beyond, if she got there.

Evie’s face might have felt like it would crack in two from the weight of the fake smile, but she would keep smiling. Until the bitter end.


End file.
